


All I Want For Christmas Is Sound Operational Protocol

by fathomfive



Category: Wolf 359 (Radio)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Gen, Shenanigans, based on Mission Mishaps: Happy Holidays, corporate holiday party hell
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-03
Updated: 2020-03-03
Packaged: 2021-02-23 05:13:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23006281
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fathomfive/pseuds/fathomfive
Summary: Jacobi and Maxwell attend the annual Goddard Futuristics holiday party.  A bad time is had by all.(Plus, cheese geekery, rented formal wear, stuffed animal violence, corporate small talk, and Here Comes Santa Claus.)
Relationships: Daniel Jacobi & Warren Kepler & Alana Maxwell
Comments: 18
Kudos: 47





	All I Want For Christmas Is Sound Operational Protocol

Jacobi and Maxwell rendezvoused a block from the site. Separate cabs, regular check-ins via text, all the usual procedures. Maxwell’s cab got there first, which meant Jacobi wasn’t there to see her get the hem of her dress stuck between the seats. When his own cab arrived he got out slowly, like a man about to face an execution. They shared a grim look. It was twenty-one hundred hours precisely.

“Daniel,” Maxwell said. “Your tie.”

“What about it,” Jacobi said sourly.

“It’s,” Maxwell paused, trying to settle on an adjective. “It’s a bad call,” she said.

“I was under duress,” Jacobi said. “You know I was under duress. And honestly, I think we have bigger things to worry about. Starting with the fact that we’re gonna be late.”

“Are we? Shit,” Maxwell said, digging in her clutch for her phone. The clutch was a very un-Maxwell accessory. It looked like an empanada covered in rhinestones, and it aggressively reflected all available light. Jacobi eyed it dubiously.

“If we’re talking bad calls—” he said.

“Come on,” Maxwell cut in. “Let’s just get this over with.”

The primary location: Hotel Chevalier, a glossy tower done in the modern “fuck personality, we have money” style. They paused on the sidewalk outside of the revolving door, until Maxwell was done fussing with her uncharacteristic updo and Jacobi had rearranged his expression into something lighter on the sullen resentment. He gestured her in. She rolled her eyes and went.

A fake fire flickered fake-cheerfully in the lobby fireplace, and on the TV right above it, _The Sound of Music_ was playing. The von Trapps were stamping their little buckled shoes and singing about how they had to go to bed. Jacobi and Maxwell made for the elevator as quickly as possible.

It was a long ride up. Maxwell stabbed at the buttons more viciously than was really necessary, but as they soared toward the state ballroom at the top of the tower, neither of them spoke. By this point there was nothing to be said.

 _Ding_ went the elevator. On the other side of the door, faint music was playing.

“We’ve lived through worse,” Maxwell said.

“How sure are you,” Jacobi muttered.

Then the doors were opening. They put their game faces on, and stepped out of the elevator into the room beyond.

Mr. Cutter stood front and center, holding court amid a gaggle of well-dressed people. He recognized them right away and raised his glass in greeting. He was wearing an elegant dark red suit, a silvery tie, and a beatific and upsetting smile.

“Daniel, Alana!” he said. “ _So_ glad you could make it. Happy holidays!”

The slightly manic melody of “Carol of the Bells” drifted over from the live pianist in the corner of the room. Baubles dangled from the ceiling, and spun, and shone. There were garlands and bells and fake snow made of cotton, and a single plastic menorah sitting forlornly in a window. The air smelled like butter and pine and alcohol neither of them could afford. And now that Cutter was looking at them, _everybody_ was looking at them.

“We’re so happy to be here,” Maxwell said.

“Really been looking forward to it,” Jacobi said. “Happy holidays.”

The bespoke crowd offered a series of disinterested smiles and nods and greetings. The usual suspects were all there, for all the usual crimes (and also some cutting-edge, proprietary crimes whose patents were still pending). There was David Clarke, looking refined and bored, Rachel Young, looking refined and bored and calculating, plus assorted Board members, team leads, HR people, and PR people. A couple servers had wandered into the corporate small-talk scrum and were having trouble getting out.

And there was Major Kepler, who was trying to kill them with his eyes. As soon as Cutter’s attention was elsewhere, he bore down on them.

“You’re _late_ ,” he said. He seemed ready to keep going, but his gaze landed elsewhere. His brow knitted. “Jacobi,” he said after a moment. “Your tie.”

“Is an honest effort,” Jacobi said, peeved. “Look, situational pressures—” He snapped his mouth shut as Kepler reached out, flipped his collar, and began untying and retying his tie with deft fingers. Maxwell snickered behind her clutch.

“Not below the belt,” Kepler tugging the knot tight and stepping back to a normal distance. “What are you, an accountant?”

“No sir, thank you sir,” Jacobi said, looking studiously at the giant glitter snowflake dangling over his head. “I’d say it won’t happen again, but, you know.”

“ _What_ does the SI manual say about defeatist attitudes,” Kepler said.

“Obedience is the only attitude required,” they chorused.

“Carol of the Bells” hit a particularly egregious part. Amid the panicky plink-plinking of the keys, Mr Cutter glided into their midst.

“You two look so nice,” he said. “Warren, don’t they look nice?”

“I would expect nothing less,” Kepler said.

“It’s _so_ good to see everyone here together,” Cutter went on. “This party’s something special, and I hope you appreciate it as much as I do. I mean, when else do we get so many of Goddard’s leading lights in one room? And at such a cheerful time of year.”

“Yes,” Kepler said. He looked meaningfully at Jacobi and Maxwell.

“Ye-es,” Jacobi said.

“Absolutely,” Maxwell said.

“Carol of the Bells” thundered on toward its crescendo. Cutter raised his glass, and watched light sparkle off the wine inside.

“I’ll tell you a secret,” he said. “Even though it’s a non-denominational winter holiday party, I have _such_ a soft spot for Christmas music. It really sets the mood.”

Kepler pursed his lips. “We may have to agree to disagree on that one,” he said.

Cutter sipped and sighed and showed his teeth. “Ah, well,” he said. “Suit yourself, Warren. ‘Peace on Earth will come to all, if we just follow the light.’”

“Peace on Earth,” Kepler said speculatively. “Tall order.”

“Oh, it’s all about perspective, Warren,” Cutter said, smiling. “It’s all about how high you set your sights.”

Jacobi and Maxwell sensed that the conversation had gone out of their pay grade, and kept quiet. Kepler watched Cutter warily. Cutter looked upon the awkward silence he had made, and saw that it was good.

“Well,” he said, still smiling, “don’t let me keep you, especially not from the hors d’ouevres! If you’re not enjoying the party, I’m not enjoying the party. I mean, I will be, but I also want you to be enjoying the party. It’s mandatory.”

“Don’t worry,” Kepler said. “I made that clear.”

“I can always count on you,” Cutter said.

He drifted away through the crowd, and Jacobi let out a long breath. Maxwell grimaced. Kepler remained stoic, but in a long-suffering kind of way.

A server approached them with a tray of grilled shrimp impaled on frilly toothpicks. Kepler waved her off, but Jacobi snagged one as she pivoted toward the next cluster of guests. He turned it over and tried to figure out where you were supposed to start. The legs were still on.

“Twice around the room is the fashionable thing to do,” Maxwell said hopefully. “And then we leave, to preserve the air of mystery. I’ve heard.”

“Nice try,” Kepler said. “But you don’t need an air of mystery. You need professionalism.”

“Really? I’d hate for us to be unfashionable,” Jacobi said. “Once and a half around the room, how about that.” He bit carefully into the tail end of the shrimp. The legs tickled his nose.

Kepler gave an annoyed huff. “You are not children,” he said, “waiting to be excused from the short table with the plastic plates so you can go and play. You’re here to represent the department. And so help me, you are going to _mingle_.”

“But sir—” Maxwell said.

Kepler made a wordless noise of menace.

“Yes sir,” Maxwell said. Mouth full of shrimp, Jacobi nodded.

“Good,” Kepler said. He gave them one last narrow look and stalked off in the direction of the restrooms.

“How’s the shrimp?” Maxwell said, after a moment’s disgruntled silence.

“Unbelievably good,” Jacobi said. “There’s lemon zest or something. If I get enough of these toothpicks maybe I can put myself out of my misery.”

“And leave me here alone?” Maxwell said. “Don’t you dare.”

The ballroom was filling up. Conversational groups were forming like crystals in solution, and at least one person in each of them was describing their ski trip in smug detail. The interns had herded together for safety, and were moving warily across the floor toward the bar.

“I vote we go mingle with the buffet table,” Maxwell said.

“Hey,” Jacobi said, perking up. “You think there’ll be cheeses?”

At the west end of the room was a long, lavish buffet setup. Jacobi and Maxwell began making their way down the parade of hors d’ouevres, each more intricate and bafflingly constructed than the last. Maxwell picked up a brittle wedge of something crispy, adorned with a smear of pink paste and two tiny leaves. It shattered as soon as she bit into it, and she had to cram all the little pieces into her mouth at once. Jacobi snorted into his hand.

At twenty-one twenty hours, things were running smoothly. Maxwell had made successful small talk with two people from Human Resources whom she did not know and whose names she had immediately forgotten. Jacobi had found the cheese plate.

“Are you taking notes?” she said, watching him check the labels.

“Do you even know how hard it is to source a small-batch Alpine cheese like this in the States?” he said, typing furiously on his phone. “God. There are fennel seeds in this _._ ”

“And that’s...good?” she said.

“It’s groundbreaking,” he said. A server went by with a tray of champagne flutes. “Hey!” he said, waving. “Hey—‘scuse me. Is your manager onsite? I’ve got some questions.”

The server’s expression made the barely-perceptible shift from polite disinterest to polite apprehension. “Of course, she’s in the kitchen,” he said. “Is there a problem?”

Jacobi stabbed a finger in the direction of the small-batch Alpine cheese with the fennel seeds. “I’ve got some questions about your supplier,” he said. “Take me to your leader.”

He was back on the floor by twenty-one thirty, looking triumphant. On his way back, Maxwell saw him detour from the kitchen to to slip the pianist some cash.

“How’d the fact-finding mission go?” she said. The latest carol ended, and the pianist swung into an enthusiastic rendition of “I’d Do Anything For Love (But I Won’t Do That).”

“Intel acquired,” Jacobi said, waving a slip of paper. “Maybe this party was a good idea after all.”

“Found you something,” Maxwell said, pointing at a plate of tiny cheese puffs flecked with herbs. “Try these.”

Jacobi took one, put it in his mouth, and immediately reached for another. He was about to go for the third and last when Rachel Young stabbed it out from under his hand with a tiny silver fork.

“I guess they must be good, then,” Rachel said, at his dismayed expression. She chewed contemplatively and then shrugged. “Gruyère,” she said. “Oh, well.”

Jacobi forced a smile. “Happy holidays,” he said.

“Same to you, Mr. Jacobi,” she said. “Did you two just get here? I think Warren was getting a little antsy, to tell you the truth.”

“We would not know about that,” Maxwell said quickly. “We’re so happy to be here. It’s very nice.” She paused, trying to come up with something to talk about. “Do you ski?” she said.

“No,” Rachel said. “Do you?”

“No,” Maxwell said.

“How’s the, uh. The new manned space mission?” Jacobi said. “There was some fuss about that recently, right?”

“I’m sorry, updates for that project are on a need-to-know basis,” Rachel said.

“What about Cambridge?” Maxwell tried. “The new retroviral engineering lab?”

“Classified,” Rachel said mildly. “I _know_ you’re familiar with company procedure, Doctor Maxwell.”

“So you’ve never even _wanted_ to ski?” Jacobi tried.

“Not recreationally,” Rachel said. “But the details of that incident are for clearance levels four and up.” Her expression of mild amusement had remained steady the whole time.

“I hear we’re getting a new minifridge for the R&D break room,” Jacobi said.

“That is true,” Rachel said. “The old one had to be thrown out. A yogurt problem, apparently.”

“Well,” Maxwell said after a moment. “That’s nice.”

“If you’ll excuse me,” Rachel said, “I need to go remind the pianist that there’s a pre-approved song list for a reason.” She waved in a manner that indicated that the conversation was over, which was something you could only get away with after a certain salary level. They watched her approach the unsuspecting pianist on the other side of the room.

“That’s an innocent man you just did that to,” Maxwell said. “How do you feel about that?”

“I mean, fine,” Jacobi said. “As long as it’s not me.”

Rachel leaned over the pianist’s shoulder, smiling a smile they were both very familiar with. She said something quietly, leaning close to his face. The song faltered over a few wrong notes and stopped entirely. When it started again it was a plinking, tentative “Silent Night.”

By twenty-two hundred, Jacobi had eaten Maxwell’s weight in things made of pastry and expensive cheese. Maxwell had put her sparkly clutch down and been forced to watch as a caterer mistook it for a decoration and tied it to the ceiling. Kepler was drifting in and out of the crowds like a tiger in tall grass, and they were both giving him a wide berth.

Now Maxwell was crouched behind a non-denominational holiday tree, taking her heels off while Jacobi stood guard.

“The Major’s not looking over here, is he?” she hissed through the branches. “My feet are killing me.”

“No, no, he’s just—” The branches jostled. “Oh my god,” Jacobi said. “Alana. Alana, get out here.”

“What?” Maxwell said, shoving her shoes up against the tree stand and scrambling back to her feet. She poked her head out, craning over Jacobi’s shoulder. “What is it?”

Jacobi pointed.

Rachel and Kepler were standing under the crossbeam at the north end of the room, staring at the sprig of mistletoe over their heads. A Board member had pointed it out to them. He was still standing imprudently close, but everyone else in the vicinity had backed up about five feet.

“Get your phone,” Maxwell said.

“You get your phone,” Jacobi said, already filming.

“It’s down the front of my dress,” Maxwell said. “I’ve been trying to get it out for the past ten minutes. Send me that, okay?”

“Unless it ends up being evidence in a murder trial, absolutely,” Jacobi said.

The perimeter was getting wider. Rachel spun her tiny dessert fork around and gripped it in her fist. Kepler shifted his weight into a combat stance, remembered there were people around who would like some plausible deniability about the existence of corporate black ops squads, and forced himself to stand like a regular uncomfortable person.

“We can settle this in a civilized manner,” he said.

She offered him a glassy, dangerous smile. “Where’s the fun in that?” she said. The face he made in reply said he was pained to agree with her.

The pianist started playing “Do You Hear What I Hear?” The interns shuffled backwards en masse until they began to tumble into the coat check. David Clarke swayed indecisively, smoked salmon roll in one hand and wine in the other, looking around to see if someone else was going to do something. Rachel and Kepler kept staring each other down. Neither of them had blinked.

A glass went _ting-ting._ Heads turned haltingly. Cutter was standing at the center of the dance floor, and a pair of caterers were wheeling out a table laden with gifts. He lowered the spoon from his glass.

“Guess what time it is, everybody!” he said.

Rachel and Kepler had a wordless conversation with their faces, and then broke from their places and headed toward him in perfect lockstep. That way it didn’t count as backing down.

“Aw, lame,” Jacobi said, and put his phone away.

“That’s right,” Cutter said, even though nobody had volunteered an answer. “It’s Secret Santa time!”

Mutters swept over the gathering. Rachel and Kepler marched toward the gift table like heretics to a pyre. Cutter plucked a slim black box from the table.

“Gosh, I can’t _wait,_ ” he said.

Slowly the party started converging on the center of the room. They arranged themselves like a bullseye of power and privilege: Board members and department heads in the center, with job titles getting successively less impressive as you got toward the outside. Jacobi and Maxwell hovered around the middle, with the other people whose job descriptions said “developmental staff” but whose reports were heavily redacted and stored on secure servers.

“Oh, David,” Cutter said, reading the label on the box, “Looks like you’re first! It’s from Warren.”

Clarke knocked back the contents of his glass, held it out until a server took it from him, and accepted the box. He and Kepler shared a cursory nod. Clarke felt gingerly around the edges of the box, and then started in on the tape with the air of someone who hadn’t ripped wrapping paper since the age of five. The tape Kepler used must have been good. It took several minutes.

Inside was a cream-colored tie, solidly on the line between tasteful and bland. Clarke’s shoulders sagged minutely in relief. He and Kepler had gone a record ten months without a major interdepartmental feud.

“It’s a hemp fiber blend,” Kepler said smoothly. “Very comfortable on the neck, or so I’m told. Tie it tight. That’s the style these days.”

“How kind,” Clarke said dryly. “I shall wear it to the next all-departments progress meeting.”

Clarke gave the head of HR an airy gray shawl that both set off her eyes wonderfully and made her start sneezing the moment she unwrapped it.

“Looks lovely on you,” he said, watching her wipe her streaming eyes with the back of her hand.

“Is this about the staff development initiative?” she said thickly. “That was last year. What’s this made of?”

“I didn’t have you last year,” Clarke said. “It’s just angora. Perhaps you’re coming down with something.”

“Unlikely,” she said, and doubled over in a violent sneeze. “We can—I _told_ you we can rethink the motivational speaker series.”

“Angora cat,” Clarke said.

The garish pocket squares that followed almost brought two Board members to blows. After that was a very nice laser-etched paperweight commemorating the explosive failure of the last VX prototype, complete with spiraling bits of debris. The director of charitable giving received a winery gift certificate with a small handwritten note inside. He read it, went dead pale, and announced that he needed the restroom.

“Let’s see,” Cutter said blithely, hoisting a glitter-covered gift bag out of the pile. It twinkled and flashed, shedding liberally onto the other gifts. “Who’s next—to Warren, from Rachel.”

He held the bag out. Kepler just looked at it for a few seconds, probably counting down in his head to make sure his point came across. Finally he looped one finger through the handles. Glitter sprinkled down onto the tops of his shoes.

“You’re too kind,” he said. He was clearly imagining the bag being destroyed from a safe distance by a professional in the appropriate protective gear. He hefted it carefully and then pulled the tissue off the top.

The tissue was glittery too, and it left a silvery trail in the air in front of him. He paused, blinking rapidly.

“It’s okay to get emotional, Warren,” Rachel said.

Studiously ignoring her, Kepler plunged a hand into the bag. There was another puff of glitter, and he pulled out a stuffed bear with a jewelry box stitched to its paws. It wore a top hat and an expression of blank surprise.

He opened the box. Inside was a pair of cufflinks that made several of the bespoke crowd stop snickering and make appreciative noises. Kepler did not make appreciative noises. His expression went from closed off to locked down, complete with sirens and strobing lights.

“Silvio Giordano,” he said. “You remembered.”

“Of course,” Rachel said demurely. “What kind of colleague would I be?”

“What,” Maxwell said out of the corner of her mouth.

“Secret meaning,” Jacobi muttered. “Definitely a secret meaning. Whatever it is he’s never told me about it.”

“A couple more drinks and I’ll ask him,” Maxwell said.

“In him or in you?” Jacobi said. She shrugged.

Cutter had been watching with an air of benevolent pleasure that was pretty much entirely see-though—you didn’t have to be looking to make out the non-benevolent pleasure right behind it. He swiveled around the circle, searching out his next victim.

One letter opener, a ship in a bottle, and several scented candles later, Cutter released his hold on the gathering. After a polite ten minutes had passed, the interns began gathering their coats and bags. Another twenty after that, the support staff started filtering out.

From the dwindling hors d’ouevres table, Maxwell stared longingly at the mass of departmental assistants all trying to fit into the elevator. In a last burst of optimism, she had put her heels back on.

“That could be us,” Jacobi said, following her gaze. “It’s almost midnight. He might be cool about it.”

“ _What_ does the SI manual say about _tactical withdrawals_ ,” Maxwell intoned, in her best Kepler voice.

“Short version: don’t,” Jacobi said. “Long version: don’t unless you super have to, and then you should feel bad about it because you’re full of irreparable personal failings. Do we feel bad about it?”

As one, they looked toward the fireplace.

Kepler was there, trapped in a conversational circle that seemed frozen in time as the Chairman of the Board held forth, at length, on the time he had gone to see _Sleep No More_ five years ago. His face was set in an expression of polite tolerance. A muscle in his jaw was twitching.

“It’s his fault we’re here in the first place,” Maxwell said.

“Yeah,” Jacobi said. He didn’t sound convinced. For that matter, neither was Maxwell. “He _hates_ experimental theater.”

“He really does,” Maxwell said.

The caterers had mostly stopped circling the room. The pianist had gone home, and somebody had hooked a laptop to the room’s aged speaker system. “The Holly and the Ivy” was playing, tinny and soft. When Kepler moved, light glinted off of him.

They were SI-5, but it would take a cold pair of hearts to leave a man who was still glittering like that.

“Hell with it,” Maxwell said, and turned abruptly. “Peace on Earth, goodwill toward men—it’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make. As long as they’re not out of that rum with the sun on the label.”

“That’s the spirit,” Jacobi said, and followed her to the bar.

That was where Kepler found them some time later. He’d finally managed a tactical withdrawal from the theater conversation, and skirted the corner of the room until he got to where the alcohol was. It was late. Or, rather, early—the distinction wasn’t important. The world had acquired that blurred, unsteady quality of a night that wasn’t as young as it once was, and was going to pay for that fact in the morning.

“Hey, Major,” Jacobi said, waving as Kepler approached. He had to unstick his hand from the bar to do it. “You’re alive.”

“You’re drunk,” Kepler said, curling his lip.

“Yep,” Jacobi said. “Thank you for noticing.”

“Me too,” Maxwell said. “I’m drunk too.”

“Reminds me of when we met,” Jacobi said.

Kepler gave him a flat look and turned his attention to Maxwell, who put her hand over the spill on the front of her dress. With her other hand she tried to shield her eyes from the face he was making at her, but it didn’t do any good.

“Unbelievable,” he said, after a long and carefully timed pause. “I would expect this kind of behavior from college freshmen, not Goddard staff.” He pinched the bridge of his nose, and let his hand drop. Glitter puffed from his sleeve. “You usually have so much to say for yourselves,” he said. “Don’t disappoint me now.”

Jacobi thought about it. Then he leaned over the bar, ignoring the wet patch that immediately started soaking into his shirt, and grabbed the first bottle his hand landed on. He dragged it up over the top of the bar and presented it to Kepler.

“You could be drunk too,” he said.

Kepler blinked. His gaze dropped, just a little, and he read the label. Then he took the bottle and started heading for the door.

“Wait wait where are you going,” Jacobi said, scrambling off his stool. “Come on, we weren’t gonna abandon _you_.”

Kepler stopped. After a moment he half-turned, looking back over his shoulder.

“If all you were planning to do was make fools of yourselves at an important event, there was no point in staying,” he said. “I seem to remember you two were awfully eager to get out of this.”

“Moral support,” Maxwell said unsteadily, tipping forward on her stool. “ _That’s_ the point.” She got up and one of her heels went through the hem of her dress with a prolonged tearing noise. She bent down to untangle herself, and swished the torn fabric around. “We had a band of brothers moment and everything,” she said. “Once more unto the breach—nope, the rental company’s not going to want this back.”

“Oh, hey, rental buddies,” Jacobi said. They high-fived.

“I stand in awe of the depths of your incompetence,” Kepler said.

“After we stuck around to keep you company, too,” Maxwell said. “That was my idea.”

“The drunk part was your idea,” Jacobi said.

Maxwell narrowed her eyes at him. “I wouldn’t trust his recollection, sir,” she said. She tried to lean over conspiratorially, lost her balance, and grabbed one of Jacobi’s lapels to steady herself. “He’s, ah, had a few tonight.”

Kepler regarded them both in scathing silence. Finally he turned around and started heading for the lift again.

Over his shoulder he said, “Are you coming or not?”

They went. The elevator trip seemed longer on the way down. They swayed through the empty lobby, and swayed out onto the empty street. All around them, tall buildings were lit up and sparkling against the darkness.

They piled into the back seat of Kepler’s car and watched him linger on the sidewalk, trying to brush the glitter off his clothes. It wafted into the air and swirled around him like a sudden flurry of snow. But mostly it stayed stuck to him, and after a slight breeze sent it flying back into his face, he gave up and got in the car.

“It’ll probably come out,” Maxwell said soothingly.

“No, Doctor,” Kepler said, staring darkly at his lap. “I don’t think it will.”

He put the Rachel bear and the bottle onto the passenger seat, and pulled away from the curb.

It was a silent night, though not particularly holy, and the sky was clear. Kepler drove toward the water, and the line of his shoulders got less and less tense as the Hotel Chevalier grew smaller in the rearview. A McDonald’s sign came into view just before the exit, and Jacobi sat bolt upright in his seat. Kepler sighed heavily and put on the blinker.

When they pulled into the drive-through, Maxwell rolled down the window, and Jacobi leaned over her.

“Hi what can I get you,” said the voice on the speaker.

“Twenty chicken nuggets,” Jacobi said.

“Honey mustard,” Maxwell said, elbowing him in the gut.

“Honey mustard,” he said.

“Will that be all?” said the voice on the speaker.

“And some cups,” Kepler said.

After some searching, Jacobi located his wallet in his rented suit and passed a crumpled ten up to the driver’s seat. Kepler handed back the nuggets, but not the change. They kept driving.

“So, what’s with the cufflinks?” Maxwell said, as the buildings thinned out around them.

“Yeah,” Jacobi said, handing her a cup of honey mustard and a packet of ketchup. “Secret meaning or what?”

“Funny you should ask,” Kepler said. “It’s quite the story.”

Maxwell clenched her fist around her ketchup packet until it popped. Jacobi stared disconsolately into the nugget box.

“Oh,” Maxwell said. “Wow. Sounds neat.”

“It was about five years ago now,” Kepler said, in tones of misty recollection. “I was in Italy, a long-term operation—when you cultivate an asset as valuable as this one was, you need the personal touch. Anyway, the neighborhood I stayed in had a _very_ singular bespoke tailor who only took appointments referred by—”

“That’s very nice, sir,” Maxwell said. “But I actually just realized I prefer the mystery.”

“I also prefer the mystery,” Jacobi said.

“Knowledge is always preferable to ignorance,” Kepler said, smiling. He had slipped sideways from frustration to a brittle cheerfulness that was actually more unsettling.

Maxwell sagged back into her seat. Jacobi passed her a wad of napkins.

“You got me there, sir,” she said.

Some time later, they pulled up in the parking lot by the bay overlook. “—Not a _trace_ after the napalm was cleared away,” Kepler was saying, as the tires crunched in the gravel. “You don’t find that kind of devotion to fine tailoring any more. And to make a long story short, without his pinky finger, the seams just didn’t come out the same.” He had been talking uninterrupted through several miles of city traffic. “But I still have the memories,” he said.

“And the cufflinks,” Maxwell ventured. She had stopped following around mile two.

Kepler’s expression darkened. “And the cufflinks,” he said grimly.

The three of them got out of the car and claimed one of the weathered picnic tables at the overlook. The water was blueblack and shining, and the moon laid a trail of silver on its surface. Kepler took his multitool out of an undisclosed location on his tailored suit, and cut the foil from the neck of the bottle.

While he worked the cork free, Maxwell tilted her head to read the label. “Daniel,” she said, sounding almost sober, “you probably should have paid for this.”

“I’ll have it taken out of your paycheck,” Kepler said.

“Is he joking?” Jacobi said. “Are you joking? I can’t tell.”

“Have some champagne, Mr. Jacobi,” Kepler said. “It’s a very good year.” He shrugged out of his suit jacket and handed it across the table to Maxwell.

“Like, a very good year,” Maxwell said, reading from her phone as she pulled the jacket around her shoulders. “You might want to put in some overtime next month.”

“Agh, shit,” Jacobi said. “I don’t want to know.”

Kepler filled the plastic cups. Maxwell held hers up, and watched the bubbles slide up the sides and vanish. Kepler’s jacket had left a dusting of glitter on her hands. She wiggled her fingers and watched the moonlight catch and sparkle.

“This is a terrible after-party,” she said. “I never could get into the whole holiday thing, but I’m pretty sure this isn’t how it’s supposed to work.”

“Good tidings of comfort and joy,” Jacobi said. “ _I_ got us champagne. Not sure what else you need.”

“It’s room temperature,” Kepler pointed out.

“Again,” Jacobi said, “Honest effort.”

Kepler cast his eyes briefly skyward. When no divine intervention was forthcoming, he held his cup out. After a moment of confusion Jacobi and Maxwell tapped their own cups against it. Fifteen feet below the overlook, the waves rolled gently on the rocks.

“Happy holidays,” Kepler said.

“Happy holidays,” Jacobi said.

“Happy holidays,” Maxwell said.

They drank. It _was_ a good year. Good enough for refills—after his third, Kepler got his multitool out again and began slowly and methodically ripping out the seams on the Rachel bear. Once he had unfolded most of its body into a mass of brown minky and stuffing, he seemed to reach some essential state of peace. There was a fleck of glitter on his forehead, which neither Jacobi nor Maxwell mentioned to him.

Every so often a car went by on the road behind them. The champagne bubbles bubbled, and below them the sea rushed and retreated as rhythmically as a heartbeat. The old year was slipping away, and soon they’d have the new one at their mercy. Comfort seemed irrelevant, and joy incidental—but there was light overhead, a hundred thousand silent stars.

**Author's Note:**

> unexpected curse: every time I tried to edit this fic I ended up with Christmas music stuck in my head. by posting I hope to finally exorcise myself


End file.
